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Climbing at the Tokyo Olympics: Start times, finals schedule, how to watch

Next up for climbing: Men's finals.

Caroline Roberts Digital Editorial Intern
Caroline Roberts writes articles and notifications for CNET. She studies English at Cal Poly, and loves philosophy, Karl the Fog and a strong cup of black coffee.
Mark Serrels Editorial Director
Mark Serrels is an award-winning Senior Editorial Director focused on all things culture. He covers TV, movies, anime, video games and whatever weird things are happening on the internet. He especially likes to write about the hardships of being a parent in the age of memes, Minecraft and Fortnite. Definitely don't follow him on Twitter.
Caroline Roberts
Mark Serrels
4 min read
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Adam Ondra is probably the best climber in the world right now.

Sebastian Widmann/Getty Images

The qualifiers for climbing at the Tokyo Olympics are 

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Traditional climbing takes place outside without a predetermined route.

Getty Images

Here's what you need to know.

When to watch climbing at the Tokyo Olympics 

All the qualifiers have taken place. All that's left is the finals. First up is the men's finals, which starts at 4.30 a.m. August 5 EDT (1.30 a.m. PDT).

Full schedule:

  • Men's speed finals 4.30 a.m. August 5.
  • Men's bouldering finals 5.30 a.m. August 5.
  • Men's lead finals 8.10 a.m. August 5.

The women's finals follow a similar schedule on August 6.

  • Women's speed finals 4.30 a.m. August 6.
  • Women's bouldering finals 5.30 a.m. August 6.
  • Women's lead finals 8.10 a.m. August 6.

 In the US, NBC will broadcast events, with the BBC securing rights in England and Channel Seven, 7Mate and 7Two in Australia. All events will take place at the Aomi Urban Sports Park in Tokyo.

Who's in the climbing finals?

The finalists for the men are...

  1. Mickael Mawem
  2. Tomoa Narasaki
  3. Colin Duffy 
  4. Jakob Schubert
  5. Adam Ondra
  6. Alberto Gines Lopez
  7. Bassa Mawem
  8. Nathaniel Coleman

Bassa Mawem is expected to withdraw as a result of bicep injury inflicted during qualification.

Finalists for the women are...

  1. Janja Garnbret
  2. Chaehyun Seo
  3. Miho Nonaka
  4. Akiyo Noguchi
  5. Brooke Raboutou
  6. Jessica Pilz
  7. Aleksandra Miroslaw
  8. Anouck Jaubert

How climbing works at the Olympics

Sport climbing will be broken up into three separate disciplines: speed climbing, lead climbing and bouldering. Not every country will be represented; only 20 athletes per gender (40 climbers total) will be allowed to compete at the Games, and only 2 athletes per gender per country will compete in any given event.

FYI, the International Olympic Committee currently recognizes only two genders -- female and male. There are currently stipulations for athletes that identify as transgender, both female and male, to compete. But there aren't any guidelines or rulings for athletes who don't identify as female or male -- including those who are nonbinary, agender and genderqueer.

The combined nature of climbing at the Olympics has been somewhat controversial. Speed climbing requires a completely different skillset compared to bouldering and lead climbing. In the next Olympics speed climbing is being broken out as a separate event, leaving bouldering and lead climbing as a combined event.

Speed climbing

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Two climbers, one wall.

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Speed climbing is relatively simple: there are two climbers with safety ropes and one 15-meter wall set at a 95-degree angle. The climbers race against each other to get to the top, with the fastest one winning. The speed route is the exact same at all times: the same holds in the same position at the exact same angle. The addition of speed climbing has been somewhat controversial in the climbing community, because it requires a completely different skillset compared to other climbing disciplines.

Bouldering

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Athletes use physical and mental precision to climb to the top of a bouldering route.

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Bouldering takes place on an shorter wall, where climbers take turns attempting to scale as many routes on a four-meter-tall wall in 4 minutes. Each route (also called a bouldering problem) is laid out with hand and foot holds in a specific color, and they vary in difficulty based on the size of the holds and the way they are spaced out. A climber completes a problem by grabbing the top hold with both hands.

Bouldering has traditionally been about power and finger strength, but recently competition route setters have been creating problems that require delicate co-ordination and explosive gymnastic movements. This one will be fun to watch. 

Lead climbing

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In Lead climbing, participants secure themselves with a rope as they climb higher.

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Lead climbing is arguably the most recognizable of the three events. The climber has six minutes to climb as high on a wall that is taller than 15 meters. They use safety ropes that attach to quickdraws on their way up, allowing the rope to run freely while they stay anchored to the wall. If two athletes reach the same point on the wall, the person who got there first is the winner. 

In both bouldering and lead climbing, climbers are not allowed to practice climbing on the routes before they compete or watch each other scale the wall, and they only have a couple of minutes to study the routes and decide their strategy before the timer begins.

Medaling system

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The Olympic and Paralympic medals are made from recycled electronics. The Olympics won't change the year on the medals, by the way.

Tokyo Olympics

If you thought the qualifying system was a bit complicated, take a deep breath. There's only one set of medals awarded per gender, so all three events will go into determining which country gets the gold, silver and bronze.

The speed climbing discipline will be done in a bracket format, with athletes competing head to head, while bouldering is in a leaderboard format. Lead climbing will have a point system in which each hold on the wall counts as one point and the athlete who climbs the highest will obtain the highest score.

Once all the athletes are ordered by placement per event, their placement numbers will be multiplied, and the climbers with the lowest scores will win medals. Because of the scoring format, each climber will compete in each event. For example, if an athlete gets second place in speed climbing, third in bouldering and first in lead climbing their overall score would be six (2 times 3 times 1 equals 6). 

Who should you be watching out for?

In the men's event the favourite is almost certainly Tomoa Narasaki. Some of the other climbers like Adam Ondra and Alex Megos are considered stronger climbers in terms of their performance on real rock, but this is competition climbing and it's very different beast. Narasaki was born in the darkness of comp climbing. He's the Bane of bouldering and, of all the strong climbers, he's evolved to the weirdness of speed climbing the best. This gives him a great shot at claiming gold.
In the women's event you'd have to pick Janja Garnbret. She's been literally unbeatable in the competition scene, particularly in bouldering. There are plenty of others worth watching. From Japan both Akiyo Noguchi and Miho Nonaka have a great shot. Noguchi is probably the most decorated female comp climber of all time and Nonaka is a great all-rounder who competes well in speed -- the boogie event most top climbers are nervous about.  
Can't wait to see how it all plays out.